I am pleased to share that the Fitch Credit Rating Agency has affirmed the University’s bond rating at BB. While they lowered Roosevelt’s outlook to negative, we remain confident that the Building a Stronger Roosevelt plan remains strong.
The University’s continued goal is to balance the budget by FY20. The past financial challenges created a sense of urgency to not only evaluate current operations but also to seek new opportunities for non-tuition revenues. Fitch’s view reflects that the University is facing a difficult financial test, one to which we are responding aggressively through our Building a Stronger Roosevelt plan, which directly addresses the imperative to increase student enrollment, manage the University’s debt portfolio, and reduce expenses.
I want to stress that the rating affirmation underscores the progress we have made to date with our plan. However, our financial situation remains serious and the outlook shows we must continue to make difficult choices to get to budgetary balance by FY20.
With our Building a Stronger Roosevelt plan, I am confident we will get through these challenging times and that the University will emerge much stronger. Thank you for your continued hard work and commitment to Roosevelt. For your information, here is a link to the Fitch Ratings Report.